De Pere church helps pay off $4.4 million in medical debt in Wisconsin and Minnesota

Life Church pastors Shawn and Sonny Hennessy wanted to give back to people struggling with medical debt. Life Church donated $17,500 to RIP Medical Debt and helped cancel out $4.4 million in medical debts.(Photo: Submitted by Sonny Hennessy)

DE PERE - It was just $17,500, but a De Pere church's donation to a New York nonprofit significantly improved the finances of more than 2,000 families.

Life Church pastors Shawn and Sonny Hennessy directed the money to RIP Medical Debt, an organization that buys up and forgives the unpaid medical debts of low-income people who aren't able to pay their bills.

The donation was deeply personal for the pastors.

The Hennessys were living in Washington state 17 years ago when they lost their 18-day-old daughter, Savannah Rose, to campomelic dysplasia. The disorder can affect how a fetus develops and babies with the disorder often die during infancy.

Antico explained sometimes the medical care happened in other states, and RIP works to cancel all of a person's medical debt regardless of where it was incurred.

The church has heard from several people thanking them for the help, Sonny Hennessy said.

“Whenever we get a church faith-based organization to donate, they get to put a little blurb in the letter to tell the people 'This is from our church.' It makes our mission like a faith-based mission," said Antico. "It changes it. People respond quite well.”

In their shoes

The co-founders of RIP Medical Debt, Antico and Jerry Ashton, were not keen on the idea of buying and forgiving debt in the beginning. Ashton is also RIP's director of education and outreach.

The men initially were contracted to work with a group from Occupy Wall Street who wanted to bring attention to the inequities of debt by buying and forgiving the money owed.

“They really were of the thought that you shouldn’t have to go into debt for your health, (shelter or education),” Antico said.

Both men worked in the debt collection industry at the time and did not think getting rid of individual debts would help solve the country's debt problems, Antico said. Over time, they learned the most important impact could come from helping individuals.

The original group disbanded in 2013. In 2014, Antico and Ashton picked up the cause but struggled the first two years as they worked to get nonprofit status and donations.

Since then, RIP Medical debt has eliminated nearly $700 million in medical debt, according to its website.

Antico found himself in the very position of the people he was trying to help. To make ends meet his wife even had to "hock" some of her jewelry, he said.

"People really are one paycheck away from financial ruin when medical debt hits them,” he said.

Paying it forward

The Hennessy family had no idea how they would pay for the Savannah Rose's medical bills and burial on youth pastor salaries.

“We had hundreds of thousands of dollars that we owed," Sonny Hennessy said.

She called the hospital to figure out a payment plan and to honestly explain their situation.

They were stunned when the hospital's response was to forgive their debt.

“We were stunned because we knew that was not typical,” she said.

The couple's pastor paid for their baby's funeral costs.

Savannah Rose would have turned 17 this past February, she said. The couple now have two children.

"We just wanted to pay it forward,” Sonny Hennessy said of choosing RIP for the donation.

Contact Samantha Hernandez at (920) 431-8385 or svhernande@gannett.com. Follow her on Twitter at @svhernandez or Facebook at www.facebook.com/samanthahernandezreporter/.